Friday, March 25, 2016

The Evil of Good Friday

Holy God, we
call this day Good, but there is not much good about it.On this day we remember how Jesus was tried
and convicted by the sham courts of priests and then Romans.We remember how he was beaten and whipped and
mocked and spit upon.We remember how he
was forced to carry his own cross up Golgotha where he was crucified.We remember that his crucifixion was gruesome
and grim.We remember it all.So there is not much good to remember on this
Good Friday because of the evil that was done.

You call us
to look upon this evil, and to look upon the evil in our communities and in the
world.Every day we are faced with bad
news – the evil of the slave trade around the world; the bombings not just in
Brussels, but across the Asian and African continents; the ugliness of our
current political race; the racism that is still present in our own country and
around the world; the violence that is all over the news.

The list
goes on and on, seemingly without end.We
confess, O God, that sometimes we feel the pain of the evil in your world, but
that at other times, we put on our blinders and board up our hearts because it
is just too much.

Yet you, O God,
are always present, even in the face of evil.You look upon it, and experience pain.You know our pain when we are confronted with it.You stand with us in the midst of all that is
evil and terrifying and dismal.You dare
evil to try and overcome good.You stare
it in the face, knowing that your power is greater than the greatest evil in the
creation.

Help us, O
God, to confront the evil we experience and see.Help us to not be afraid, but to know our own
strength through the power of your Spirit; strength to not look away and ignore
that which threatens to overwhelm us.Help us to live lives filled with power and grace, lives in which evil
holds no power over us.And help us to
confront the evil of the world, whenever and however we can, in your name.

Because evil
does not have the last word.Tony Campolo
says“It’s Friday, but Sunday’s coming.”On Friday, Jesus made a spectacle of evil;
he showed the hatred we are capable of.But he triumphed over that evil with love.Your love, which is greater than anything
else, triumphs over evil in all its forms. Your love tramples hatred until it
is subdued.Your love and grace will
have the last word.

We trust in
your love, O God, even as we sit in the darkness of Good Friday.